Memoirs of a Family
by Aimlessly Unknown
Summary: They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **Owning the parents don't seem to make me feel any better about not owning Naruto.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Children always suffered more.

****_****

(_" Mommy! Daddy!")_

She was the morning person of the family, where her parents choose to sleep in and stay under the covers of their bed, Sakura leaps from hers, enjoying the cold under her feet. Each floorboard creaks under her scampering feet as she runs to their room. Her hair (always long, always for Sasuke-kun) is loose and unkempt (who has time to brush their hair?) waving behind her in a mad frenzy of roseate strands. Each muscle is stretched as she leaps onto her parent's large bed.

Eyes widen and torsos shoot up from the mattress, emerald and blue iris' blink and crinkle with the smiles that grace their faces.

("_ Good morning Sakura-chan."_)

The five-year old smiles.

**_**

(_" Momma! Papa!"_)

It's been three years and nothing has changed. She still 'loves' Sasuke-kun, she still has long hair, and she still replaces the alarm clock in her parent's room. Her feet still move as quickly and her eyes are still as bright as ever. But today instead of running as lightly as a fairy and happy as a junebug in May her steps are rough; her expression is rage and more of a storm.

She shoves her Papa to get up, and shakes her Mama. Both look over at her with sad expressions. They gather her in their arms and murmur softly into her hair, driving her to tears and letting the flood begin.

("_ We're sorry hime, we know you miss Ino-chan."_)

But it's so much more than that.

**_**

She doesn't know how it happened, how it came to pass. All she knows is that it changed the course of her life forever. Her husband holds her tight and his fresh oceanic smell wafts into her sinuses, calming her more than all the massages in the world. Her hand winds into his blonde locks and begins to feather through the strands.

(_" I know you miss them, koi."_)

You'll never understand Naruto.

(_It was not time that took them from her, it was ninja. It was moments that passed that made her realize they were gone. She always woke them up, always took that small pleasure of seeing them wake first thing in the morning. But the moment on her fifteenth birthday was one that changed her. When she went to wake them – _)

Her eyes shut and let several tears slip out.

_( - They didn't open their eyes_)

(" **Momma…Papa…**")

**_**

**Oh the end is near. HAHA! Yeah so I'm redoing this and throwing in some NaruSaku but only a little bit. Like this is it. Unless I get a request then I can throw in some more for my lovely fans :D just kidding, I have no fans WAAH!**

**~Aimlessly Unknown (:3)**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: **Witty I-don't-own-Naruto? I think not!

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Leader's should be fair and kind. Too bad Kakashi chooses not to follow this rule.

****_****

There are two types of mentors. One takes the children under their wings and moulds them into great men and women who fight for what is right and never back down. The other doesn't see talent, they see power and take only the powerful ones and mould them. Kakashi likes to think he's the first kind, but they know he isn't.

He doesn't train Naruto or Sakura, he leaves them on the side to bleed, and he ships Naruto off to Jiraiya and doesn't check in on him. Sakura he leaves to fend for herself. Kakashi reasons with himself, Naruto is too like Obito, with his prankster mentality and bright laugh. Sakura is Rin-incarnate. With her beguiling smile and healing hands.

So he trains Sasuke, only seeing the good, ignoring the bad. He gives the boy-monster his most powerful technique and just barely lives long enough to regret it. Especially when he finds Naruto in the Valley of the End, a gaping chest wound and dull eyes.

There are two types of mentors, one is wonderful and powerful and wise. The other is pitiful and ignorant and blindblindblind. Kakashi likes to think he is the first, but they know he is the second.

Too bad Kakashi realizes this too late.

**_**


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing but the very sad plot.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Purgatory never seemed this bad in myths.

****_****

I was drowning, in fire. Surrounded, surrounded by the blood red vibrancy of heat that emanated from the fire around me, coiling around my body like a snake. The same fire that came with the wonder that reaches from ash filling your mouth and lungs with the black remains of the once so kind element.

_Drip_

I felt a slow liquid run down my chin. It was blood. The copper taste could be nothing else as I bit my lips so hard I tore the skin, bringing more blood from my mouth. I almost retched at the taste but I couldn't, not for fear that if I did I would be weak. Not for the knowledge of the vile taste. But because of the one thing I hated at the moment. There was no hate for the man that did this to me. Only hate for the one cause of my lack of screaming.

The _pain._

Dear god the pain was unbearable. The feeling of the white hot burning feeling spreading by poison into my bloodstream, ripping up my organs and destroying my innards, making me writhe in pain wrought forth in torment for my sins of murder and lies. I was strong enough not to lose my organs of ash. But I was too weak not to scream, not to plead for my life, and cry for all I was worth.

So I did.

I screamed and screamed until blood ripped from my lungs, making me choke and cry. The pain was terrible enough to make me scream and cry and plead and choke and _burn._ Just as I felt cold with death, something broke through to my ears. It was a scream, a scream to match my own. It was high-pitched, loud, fearful, and _familiar._

It was Ino.

My dear sweet Ino-pig in all her blonde-haired ethereality was screaming for me. Memories slammed into my mind like a boulder. Flashes of a meadow, of a bouquet, of laughs. It was a whirlwind of little girl memories full of little girl things. But there was one memory that stood out like a beacon in the night shining on the world. It was of blonde-hair swirling with pink, of ribbons, of flowers, of friendship…and of one word that tore it all away.

_Goodbye._

I walked away, I never wanted to see her again, or so I told myself. I wanted so badly to say I was sorry, but that meant giving up and if there was one thing she taught me, it was to never give up. And that was what I lived by. I lived by stupidity, because if there was one thing I learned as myself it was that there were times to fight, to prove, to live by determination. Then there came times to take a step back and see what you lost. And I know what I lost. I lost my only friend. I lost my Ino.

And so I burn in repentance.

Through the screaming I heard a sob, a heavy sob of anguish like that of the families I once had to tell had lost a person I _should have saved_. I knew those tears, I knew that pain, and I knew who it was. I knew it because I had heard it in the still of night during a mission. I'd heard it when Hinata-chan fell, badly wounded, at the hands of Kisame. Now she was healthy and happy with her children…with her husband.

Uzumaki Naruto.

My brother-in-arms, my best friend, my Hokage. I remembered his tan, strong arms wrapped around me in a hug when Sasuke left. I remembered his grin when he told me he was to marry Hinata, the love of his life. I remembered his reaction when Sasuke came back. A punch to the face, a kick to the gut, and a hug that made me flare with love. But mostly I remembered a day five years ago, a promise made by a boy no older than twelve, but with the heart of a twenty year old man reborn. A promise for love and a promise born out of love that he has not known. I remember his promise to me.

_I'll bring him back; it's the promise of a lifetime!_

I had smiled to him, a small grateful smile. Then he left. I waited for days, when I received news he had returned I dropped my work and ran from my sensei. I skidded to a stop outside of the gates and saw something horrific. Uzumaki Naruto, the unbeatable, was lying pale on the ground…as if he was dead. And I cried, he wasn't supposed to die for a stupid promise! But he was alive, brought from deaths door as quickly as he arrived. And I hugged him, with strained muscles, tired eyes, and a bleeding heart.

I gripped to him tightly, still crying. I whimpered like a child and breathed slowly. He relaxed a bit, holding tighter. He must've thought I was in less pain, I was getting better. The truth was, I was growing numb to the pain, and it was more of a sting. I blinked in and out of consciousness.

Then it happened. It was no epiphany of life, no. It was a rip of pain through my body. Just as soon as I drifted out, I was brought back. I felt a scream rip dangerously from my throat. I felt myself writhe and scream and _plead _for death. And all I thought, all I could comprehend was that even though I shouldn't have cared, I should've just been happy with the fact that the pain would stop, that all of my friends were here, was that…Uchiha Sasuke – my love and idol, the one I died for – wasn't even here.

The one you love the most, will be the one to hurt you in the end.

**Well this was fun to redo.**

**~Aimlessly Unknown**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto or Tenten, but this is something anyone would hate.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Tenten knows the balance of life and death.

****_****

Tenten refuses to kill.

She thinks this is because of that moment in time in her life when Tenten doesn't think she can be a kuniouchi. A time way back when her name was still pronounced 'Teh-Teh' instead of the distinct diction she practices so no one will confuse her steel (_because it has to be her steel or else she'll never make her own name.) _for someone else's. The time is brief – a mere flash of a moment elongated for the singular purpose of scaring her half to death – but it scars in her heart forever.

She's only five when it happens. The day she finally (_after hours and days and months of begging her father_) is allowed to touch the **steel**. The weapons she has awed and drooled over for a year now. Her small hands wrap around the kunai like it was meant to be, like the tan colour of her hand is _meant _to hold this black symbol of the war she doesn't know exists.

She goes outside to practice, throwing and moving with the kunai like a dance, thinking of new ways to test its powers. Already formulating new moves to access every muscle in her body (_That Hyuuga boy that Daddy talks about isn't the only genius!_). It's only when she throws the kunai, only when it leaves her strong sturdy hand and flies without waver into the bushes.

Then there is a scream.

Maybe just a shriek, an animal; she moves slowly – fearfully – to where the kunai landed. She can't keep down the bile in her throat from rising when she sees a bunny, a _pregnant_ bunny, lying there, in a pool of blood she caused. She starts screamingrantingcrying until she can't screamrantcry anymore. She makes a promise to herself (_and she'll carve it into her fucking skin if she has to._) to nevernevernever take another life as long as she lives.

Tenten refuses to kill.

She lives long enough to stare at her hands and never see them run red with blood.

****_****

**I've always loved this idea, and when it popped into my head I HAD to write it down. :] tell me whatcha think!**

**~AU**


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: **The cookie–dough is mine but Naruto is not.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **She feels it because – to her – there's nothing else to feel.

****_****

She's on the ground now, sitting, waiting, becoming part of the earth. She's in the sky, breathy and wild and free like the wind she loves so much. She's everywhere and everything.

_move_

Then there's something else; a voice. A loud, dark, ambiguous voice that effuses itself to her and burns. She's wondering why it's there. Wondering why she knows it.

_move_

It's angry. It's mean and erupt with a rage she doesn't want to understand (_she's not sure she _could _understand!_). She doesn't like this voice because this voice isn't nice. It's not nice at all and she doesn't like not-nice things.

**don't move. stay down. don't try.**

She likes this voice; it's warm and soothing and doesn't make her do things she doesn't know she wants. She likes this voice; she's just not sure it likes her.

**why move? who would care? no one. that's who.**

Why would no one care? Is she worth that little? Sometimes she hates herself. Maybe that's why no one likes her. No one likes someone who hates themselves. She decides she's not going to move, she's going to ignore that angry voice in favor of a nicer one. Of a voice filled with lies and empty words and a sharp truth she's going to have to face. The mean one (_the one full of truth and comfort and anger that belies it all_) is going to have to wait.

Wait until she rises like the phoenix from the flame to take back what has been so cruelly ripped away. And when she does rise, she'll know only one thing.

There will be _hell _to pay.

**_**

**The summary may not fit with the chapter but it makes some semblance of sense to me.**

**~AU**


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: **I do not own. But I smile, and that's enough.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Naruto talks, Sasuke listens, Kakashi laughs but Sakura…Sakura cries.

****_****

Naruto does not cry; Naruto talks.

(_he doesn't whisper either, he talks, full and loud and puffed up with dreams and sunshine no one cares to see. he boasts to the wind, he tells the trees about his day, he makes _damn_ sure the earth can hear him if no one else will bother. he takes his time – explaining in great detail about everything that passes through his mind, he speaks of pranks and love. after all, the earth has never had a voice, and Naruto is glad to be it._)

Sasuke does not talk; he listens.

(_he has never input anything into a conversation, but they are okay with that, because it's just how Sasuke is. his dark eyes watch and wonder but he never utters a syllable because if he does he knows his heart will put words in his mouth and let them tumble unabashedly from those two fine lines Sakura is dying to feel. but that's what makes him a good friend, they suppose, because he doesn't offer words of comfort but he doesn't make anything worse. he lets you grow to be what you are, he lets _you _be the author of this book. after all, he's never been allowed to write his own._)

Kakashi does not listen; he laughs.

(_he doesn't like his normal laugh, the one he has only reserved for night when laughing covers his sobs, the one he reserved for Rin. he hears what problems his team is facing and he giggles; because what problems they have are so childish that it hurts, and the issues they cry about are so disgusting from human nature that he has to laugh. he has no option but to laugh, but after all, when has the 'song of the White Fang' _ever _had a choice?_)

But Sakura – little frail Sakura – she does not laugh, or talk, or listen; she cries.

(_she cries because her team – her family – can't. she grieves for Sasuke's lost family because he refuses to. she sobs, loud and hard, for Naruto's disgusting childhood because she knows so well that his bright blue orbs will never drip with tears, because he's too strong for that. she cannot restrain her own twin trails of water for Kakashi, because Naruto has never had a family, Sasuke has lost his, but Kakashi has gone through both and to her that's more heartbreaking than anything. but mostly she cries because Naruto never did when Sasuke left, she cries because Sasuke killed his own _brother_, and she cries because Kakashi has watched it all happen, helplessly. And, after all, Sakura knows so well how that feels._)

--

**It's so sad, but I love this entire idea. But I give most credit to Azamiko, for her story '****Speaking to Silence****' is what inspired me and gave me this entire idea. Yes, in his/her story Naruto talks and Sasuke listens, but I took it a bit farther…so I **_**am **_**giving her/him credit. I am not copy-catting…much :P**

**~AU**


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: **Naruto no es mio.

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **Gaara remembers her.

****_****

He wonders why no one wants to play with him as he sits in his sandbox. He plays with the sand as time passes, letting it slip through his pudgy fingers and pulling it back up. He prefers playing with his hands instead of using Mother, who makes the sand hurt him. Before he knows it there's another hand playing with the same sand. Mother doesn't like it.

But Gaara does.

He likes the soft pretty hand that plays and shapes sand with him. He sees pink, and then there's a face to go with the pretty hand. With pretty pretty pink hair and big greengreen eyes. They play together, him and Haruno Sakura-chan, shaping sand into birds, into trees, ad into little animal creatures she loves. He asks if she can play tomorrow, if he can tuck this small piece of happiness into his tomorrow. She looks sad for a moment and says she can't.

He's mad now, at himself, at Mother for letting her in, at her for being so gosh darn sweet!

She hugs him tight, and gives him a small piece of her, a ribbon to be exact. He tucks it away, fearful that if Father finds out he'll take her away. Her with her big greengreen eyes and pretty pretty pink hair.

5 years passes, he's stronger now, more powerful, and when he is sent to Konoha – where _she _is from – he is ready to take her back. Back to him and that sandbox where they can laze the day away.

He sees the pink, the long pretty pink, and the eyes, large green eyes, and his heart – small and unused – is starting to break. Because she's so different. Her hair and eyes are the same, but her voice – small, hard, whole – is screechy and loud. Her eyes fawn over the Uchiha (_he's never wanted to kill anyone so badly_).

He remembers her.

(_the adventures and smiles and joyjoyjoy he's never felt since then_)

But he doesn't want to.

**_**

**Oh my lawd, I've finally finished 5 chapters. This is why I like drabbles so much :P.**

**I LOVE YOU ALL! Except you in the back, you I don't care for.**

**~AU**


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: **I has Oreo's but I don't has ownership of Naruto

**Summary: **They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

**Summary of Chapter: **If someone looked into your eyes they'd see the lie.

****_****

Your heart is breaking.

No one is around to hear it; they're too busy fussing over the dinner and your honeymoon and your dress. But you can tell, you can hear the cracks and the breaks and all those stupidstupidstupid little aching whines your heart is making. Sometimes you wish you were one of those other people who seem completely oblivious to your dilemma.

He can hear it though.

His all seeing (_beautiful beyond all belief that make you go weak at the knees_) eyes pierce your empty smile and see into your very soul. This is why you love him.

Not that guy sitting in your living room with his pretty green eyes (_but they aren't deepperfectoceanic blue_ _like __**his**_) and his soft brown hair (_but they aren't that bright blonde that shines in the sea of mundane people_) so he can't be loved like he should be.

You wish with all your little heart that you can change this. That _he _can be the one at the end of this small hall, waiting for you to say those magic words.

But it isn't him.

It's someone else.

(_your heart is breaking_)

You wonder if you deserved this.

**_**

**I am so confused by this…tell me what you think! :]**

**~AU**


	9. Chapter 9

_Disclaimer_: I do not own!

_Summary_: They were a family, a team, so much more than anything anyone could think of. They were Team Seven, and these are their stories.

_Summary of Chapter_: She wants to burn.

* * *

"You are so very empty, darling." He whispers in the night, placing an icy hand on her sunken cheek, "So very, very empty indeed."

(_and that is how he likes her – empty and broken and starving for his attention_)

Her apple-grass lashes flutter over her starlight eyes and she smiles, "Will you give me something to fill me?"

(_she wants to burst like sunlight and explode in a presence that no one can ignore_)

He nuzzles into her neck and purrs darkly, "Oh? What do you wish for? Diamonds for the tears falling down your cheeks," His hand pets the area just beneath her eye, "Perhaps emeralds for your eyes of thought and light, my love," He passes a hand over her eyes and they shut as if by magic. She smiles deeply, making her face seem stretched and taut against her bleached bones.

She whispers, "_Love_. I want to fill with love, so as to burn."

(_her heart stutters in her chest because there is a memory somewhere in her mind that fills with blackened eyes and thick blonde hair and a mask that does not come down_)

And he laughs – a harsh, grating sound – pulling her to his room and shows her the false meaning of love.

(_and she does burn but it is not for love, it is for freedom and light and things he has kept her from, because she is the moth and he is the flame and she will _burn –

– ashes to ashes we all fall down.)

* * *

Review please!

Aimlessly Unknown.


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